In February of 2011, wildland fires outside of Amarillo, Texas destroyed 70 homes, burned more than 25,000 acres of land, and caused nearly $6 million in property damage. Thanks to a collaborative effort between NIST and the Texas Forest Service (TFS), these fires will soon be the most thoroughly investigated and scientifically evaluated events of their kind. During a three-week reconnaissance, a NIST-developed data collection methodology was used to acquire approximately 163 gigabytes of data and more than 11,000 photographs to document two of the blazes, now known as the Willow Creek and Tanglewood Complex fires. This massive amount of accumulated information will now become the foundation for a NIST-TFS study assessing the impact of the two wildfires on structures in the region. >> More